Tuesday, December 20, 2011

As I mentioned in my previous post, Jackson and his preschool class had their winter performance last week! Mommy Nannette, Daddy, and Mama were there to support our little snowman! Ms. Sierra's class of two year olds was the BEST...no, really, they were! They had the cutest matching outfits and you could tell they had practiced for weeks!

We asked Jackson to perform for us at night leading up to his debut and he loved to show us his moves. The only thing that threw us off on the Big Day was that the kids didn't sing...I think there was a little stage fright. At the dress rehearsal in front of the whole school (ages infant-kinder), Ms. Sierra said Jackson sat right next to her and said he was scared. She had never seen this side of our happy and outgoing boy, but she said he was great once on stage. He made sure to tell me that the boys wore hats and the girls wore bows. SO CUTE!

After the show we enjoyed a preschool party in his classroom and ate, what else?

We visited Great Grandpa Bill last weekend and look how happy these guys are! Grandpa turned 90 in July and he looks amazing! So happy to have these genes!

Santa Jack and Libby's Tina dog.

That night Sierra and I went downtown for his work party. Woo hoo! Look at this amazing sunset from our room! GORGEOUS! We had an awesome night followed by a sleep-in session without our favorite toddler at the Hilton. Their business is growing so there were so many new faces this year! Also new this year--the social committee; Nadine and Jessica! Great job, ladies! Sorry my husband is so competitive and LOUD.

We checked in and were ready in less than 30 minutes for a fun night DTSD!

Oh how I love O'Douls...it really tastes like beer and you even get fun stares from strangers! Now who has the video of Sierra's annual PDI dancing?!?

I'm on winter break!!! Last week was exhausting with students and teachers eager for our two week break, a staff baby shower for me, a preschool performance and party, prepping for: Christmas, a special boy's 3rd birthday party, and Kelly's baby shower...as well as Sierra's work party...phew! Jackson and I both slept until almost 8 a.m. this morning and it was AMAZING!

CRAFT #1

I wanted to share a fun and easy craft/treat for winter--Reindeer Pops! Jackson and I made these last week for his first preschool performance and winter party. They were a hit. Thanks to my new mommy friend (and friend since 7th grade), Virginia, for sharing the recipe with us!

Counting out 18..."Mom I'm just going to dump the bag and then count. If any fall, I'll eat them!"

Extra pieces of pretzels went into the extra chocolate bowl...chocolate covered pretzels!

TIPS: do each pop individually or have another adult to help because the chocolate dried so fast that I had to redo Jackson's handy work so we could stick on the eyes, nose, and antlers. There was no point to scoring the marshmallows since the chocolate had hardened over my scores. The "block" is floral foam wrapped in leftover Christmas wrap.

CRAFT #2

Wine cork Ornaments! A friend gifted me one of these cute reindeer ornaments several years ago and I've been making them each year ever since. They are great little gifts to give to large groups of people and are super easy to make! I have a new hot glue gun that is HOT so I did have a minor burn from one of these guys...but they are worth it!

TIP: Save your wine corks all year so you have enough on hand. Or, just drink a lot of wine during Thanksgiving. ;)

Isn't the snowman cute? That was Jackson's idea. He was in charge of counting out the red and brown noses and said the white should be snowmen.

CRAFT #3

It seems like Gingerbread Houses are a Kindergarten tradition. I share a loft with two kinder teachers so I get to copy all of their cute crafts! Last year Jackson decorated a Gingerbread Man and this year I promised him we would make a house. Sierra helped us with this craft as I'm not the best builder and Sierra likes Legos...so he must like putting up gingerbread houses, too? Well...you get the idea.

House is frosted and ready to decorate!

Steady with those gumdrops on the roof!

and it's still standing three days later!

TIPS: expect to eat a lot of the ingredients as you make your house...

Sunday, December 11, 2011

One of my "must haves" on our new home list was to have a window facing the street so that at Christmastime you could see the tree from the window.

ta da!

When we moved here in March I couldn't wait to decorate for the holidays...and all of the sudden it was December and time to decorate. We enjoyed doing this last weekend together as a family. Sierra made us some decaf Starbucks and Jackson watched "A Charlie Brown Christmas" as we put up the decorations around the house. I had forgotten I had bought this last year during the after Christmas sales! Now where did I put the soundtrack?

"Mom can I check out our beautiful tree and look at presents?"

At one point, Jackson threw an ornament the Bartels had given him last year--a football--across the room... yelling, "HIKE! Football!" He was pretty upset when it crashed into 50 pieces.

Abby's new spot for the next month.

really wanted to do matching stockings
but just couldn't give up our originals!

We had a guy come out and install our lights on the house this week so it's official...we are 'tis-ing the season!

"That's not a bowl full of jelly!" --Marissa Johnson ::31 weeks::

We had our first Santa sitting at Sea World. Jackson met Santa last year four times so we will see how many of Santa's helpers we will sit on this year. He wasn't a big fan of the snow because he didn't have his "snow hat," but he managed to scoop some up with his buddies Chloe and MJ.

Santa gave him LOTS of advice on being a big brother
and guessed he is having a sister.

"Santa, please can I have a race car?!"

these scoopers are hard to come by!

Normally baking isn't my favorite thing as I prefer cooking, but apparently pregnancy brings out the Betty Crocker in me. Jackson is my little Bobby Crocker. He LOVES to help and even gets out the ingredients for me now! We made another batch of Pumpkin Cookies for preschool's bake sale and then some yummy chocolate chocolate chip and walnut cookies just because mama was craving them. HO! HO! HO!

Sunday, December 4, 2011

...and she did it again! Ashley Perry managed to make our growing family look and feel good during this photo session at Old Poway Park so we could get a picture for our Christmas card. I also wanted to get some belly shots since we never did that for Jackson...something special just for Riley since most of the "firsts" have been consumed by our first! A little candy bribes never hurt an almost-three-year-old soon-to-be-Big-Brother, right? Thank you, Ashley, for another AWESOME experience. xoxo